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Trading means financial transactions. Sometimes huge transactions.
For your personal trading and/ or for third parties too.
With leverage. It is a real business - for YOU?
Now that you are connected online with your broker you needed to sign contract(s) and read
every fine print to accept what data is exchanged between you and your broker.
And you were aware about where you drop your money and work with it.
You expect to be able to get it back again.
Of course

Now:
You want to get some sophisticated software for charting and maybe some other cool stuff to
send you all information to any media channel when you are NOT glued to your trading screen.

COOOOOOLL!!!!
Your charting software "reads" every trade, stop loss, open order, P&L etc. you name it
from your brokerage account. Further you are allowed to trade "right out of the charting package"
and send these order(s) via open API to your brokerage. YOU want to get all information in ONE chart - right?
Then the package lets send you signals / mails / sms / etc. to all your electronic devices… with every single order
without protection - so everyone can read/hear/copy ??

Cool - or not so cool?
Of course not so cool: The enemy is sitting right beneath your next mouse click!!!
Are you sure your charting package / super trooper indy etc. does not send a blind copy
to a different predefined address you do not know about? Instantly online?
You do NOT have a contract with your charting software company like you do have with your
broker concerning data flow, privacy, etc. with a many pages confidential contract paper!
And these companies are even free to do everything with your personal trading strategies, gains
and losses on your account(s) or phone numbers / mail addresses. Your rights with them are ZERO.
The leakage sits within your own computer/software though.

So - what if your tax administration knows about your transfers / trading gains etc.
even BEFORE YOU get your next statement the other day?

Now what to do against these obvious scam possibilities?

I would like to discuss in this thread strategies to protect actions of every single trader to stay
in the calm zone without having that many open ears to follow your personal daily trading work.
To not be overwhelmed by spies right around the corner that steal information not belonging to them.

I am protecting myself with a few basic steps.
1) Having a broker with 2 accounts - a real trading account and a SIM account or
having two brokers - thus 2 accounts (1 which is active traded - 2nd only for charting purposes)
2) Getting a chart software where the connections for realtime pricing
comes in from the SIM and NOT from the traded account
3) Having historical backfill data on this untouched charting program to get the bigger picture
4) NEVER trading out of the charting package - instead trading only on the broker's platform
5) having never automated trading out of the charting package
6) never sending out signals about open or closed trades / signals etc. to a second electronic
device phone, tablet or other computer station (mail / twitter included)

The theme here is not about hiding anything - but to be aware of
undiscussed holes and bumps on the road.
As long as money is involved I think it is necessary to be aware
of any unforeseen problems - especially for beginners in that
trading business.
The big discussion in our country here is about traditional banking
secrets versus other countries "need" to get customer data for free.
This thread is thought as an eye opener and thinking on how to
react proactive to be prepared on future "questions".

Just clap your hands to any totalitarian government, let them send you and your kids to war, let them control your lives, minds, opinions with fear and decrease the standart of living for each and every one being not in the direct beneficial circle.

And when you don´t like that and speak openly against that, believing in human rights, free speech and democracy, they of course spy on you and maybe destroy your life. Not only in Russia.

Last totalitarian government "for all to see" ceased to exist here like 20 years ago and now the political soldiers pass laws for complete surveillance of all citizen as suspected criminals (not for themselves, of course, passed a law for not needing to show from where and whom they earn additional money besides the taxpayer´s), to be allowed to roll the army under weapons through the cities and currently buying killer drones for domestic purposes, all completely against the constitution but not justiciable. Maybe with more technical power the socialists of the former GDR would have conserved their power against their folks and now they have learnt. (you can figure out yourself how they would have titled the demonstrants). Why was there that "change" in eastern europe again? --> economical and financial crisis!

In fact, that power loves to grow like cancer, works secretive and does not care about the laws that are there to protect the folks against those ruling at the moment, is known long, long before Snowden. I am currently reading about Sophie Scholl and the "White Rose", students murdered by the nazis for printing and distributiong papers disagreeing with the 3rd reich´s policy.

I believe you really have to think about copycats and competition when you are trading size and with success.
In this business much is possible and there is definately trading "against" others by purpose, too.

I know about professional attacks on broker´s infrastructures, for example, but interfering with some small traders i´d say is unlikely unless you are personally between the lines of competing trading companies or between very sizable traders. Of course that espionage and electronic manipulating stuff is, not at least, meant for very serious economical competition reasons. Companies who have expensive and successful research to "hide" until getting the patent, for example, know that. The financial sector surely is a serious field of interest for both, protection of the infrastructure and for monetary advantage reasons like frontrunning and/or creating serious events on some strategic agendas. That guy who tried to copy the "algo that can manipulate the markets" off goldman was found out instantaniously by surveillance.

To stamp futures executions with the trader´s / trading company´s identity at some exchanges is also something that can not only be used as protective measure against manipulating techniques but could be theoretically used to also "bucket shop" traders (happened to me not with futures but with some fraudulent US/UK CFD/forex broker after having some really good days in a row). As trader you should really be able to compare feeds/executions and move on when suspicious things to your disadvantage happen. I still hope that since the last flash crash it has become clear to the dominating participants, that they harm themselves at the end, when ppl loose trust and are not investing any more in something obviously "gamed" happening even in the regulated exchanges.

Multiple accounts and brokers/exchanges in different countries, each not too big in size, would be more secure, i think. You then can use even different datafeeds for backup/"hedging for worstcase" and also comparison reasons.

Last edited by CFuture; June 26th, 2013 at 08:33 AM.
Reason: additions